February 20, 2020, was the day on which the first COVID-19 case was recorded in Mexico. The infected person was a 35-year-old man from Mexico City, the capital of the Latin American country, who had travelled to Italy. The announcement was made by Hugo López Gatell, epidemiologist and undersecretary of Prevention and Health Promotion of […] Continue reading ->
Four more African countries will be introducing pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV) into their routine immunization schedules – as other countries across Africa said they would ramp up and revitalize childhood vaccination programmes that were hit hard by the COVID pandemic. In commitments announced this week at the 2nd Global Forum on Childhood Pneumonia in Madrid […] Continue reading ->
Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance has pledged $142 million in additional funds to expand global coverage of the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine, increasing its total investment to $600 million by the end of 2025, the organization has announced. Gavi said it expects its new investment to help reach 86 million adolescent girls by 2025, preventing over […] Continue reading ->
Gaya Gamhewage, the agency’s lead official in prevention and response to sexual misconduct, describes WHO’s recent moves to bring justice to DRC’s victims. In a long-awaited move, the World Health Organization (WHO) is preparing to share files with the Congolese courts on the sexual exploitation and abuse complaints of 13 women who are pursuing criminal […] Continue reading ->
IBADAN, Nigeria – There are high hopes that the R21/Matrix-M malaria vaccine recently approved by Ghana and Nigeria will be manufactured in Africa in the not-to-distant future – a brighter-than-usual prospect for this World Malaria Day (25 April). Earlier this month, Ghana’s Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) approved the R21/Matrix-M malaria vaccine manufactured by the […] Continue reading ->
CEOs from the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies issued a call to G7 leaders on Friday to oppose the inclusion of intellectual property rights waivers and pathogen benefit sharing in the World Health Organization’s (WHO) pandemic treaty. In meetings with Japanese Prime Minister and chair of next month’s G7 summit Fumio Kishida this week, a delegation […] Continue reading ->
When governments invest in drug research and development (R&D) with pharmaceutical companies, they should ensure upfront that these drugs are affordable and widely available – and a global pandemic accord needs to provide high-level guidance on how to do this. This is the view of the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi), a non-profit group […] Continue reading ->
A Chinese woman has become the world’s first person to die from the H3N8 strain of bird flu, the World Health Organization reported. No human-to-human transmission appears to have occurred, and the risk of the virus spreading is considered to be “low”, officials said. The 56-year-old woman from China’s southern Guangdong province is the third […] Continue reading ->
Ensuring that the HIV responses in countries receive full funding will not only lead to a 40% to 90% reduction in new infections but also result in substantial social and economic benefits, a new report launched by UNAIDS said. The socio-economic benefits countries with a fully financed HIV response will gain are higher educational outcomes, […] Continue reading ->
The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) recommends that countries on the continent move rapidly to automated disease reporting systems across the continent to cope with disease outbreaks, as Nigeria grapples with Lassa fever and Malawi and Mozambique struggle with cholera. “There has been an expected slowdown [in COVID-19 reporting] because of […] Continue reading ->